End the war on Terrorism
In the words of the acclaimed Journalist and author John Pilger has said
"the war against terrorism is a fraud"
Good afternoon ladies, and gentlemen, and adjudicator.
Ever since the horror of September 11th. We have been bombarded with the
propaganda of the "war on terrorism". The America government and her allies,
including the Australian government, Have thrown down the gauntlet,
declearing war on terrorism. Vowing to extirpate this blight from the face.
Which poses the obvious question, what is terrorism?
The United Nations Office of Drug Control and Crime Prevention (ODCCP)
legally defines terrorism as: "an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated
violent action, employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group or state
actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby - in
contrast to assassination - the direct targets of violence are not the main
targets. The immediate human victims of violence are generally chosen
randomly (targets of opportunity) or selectively (representative or symbolic
targets) from a target population, and serve as message generators.
Threat- and violence- based communication processes between terrorist
(organization), (imperilled) victims, and main targets are used to
manipulate the main target (audience(s)), turning it into a target of
terror, a target of demands, or a target of attention, depending on whether
intimidation, coercion, or propaganda is primarily sought" (Schmid, 1988).
This definition could apply to the any number of regimes including the
United States. A country with a sordid human rights record. The same country
that Martin Luther King once said was the "greatest purveyor of violence in
the world today". Distinguished MIT Professor Noam Chomsky is one of the
most vociferous critics of US government policies, he accuses the US of
being worlds biggest state sponsor of terrorism. One example Chomsky cites
is Nicaragua, Americas intervention in Nicaragua fits the ODCCPs definition
of terrorism like a glove, in the mid nineteen eighties, the CIA partially
using money earned through drug smuggling, secretly funded a terrorist army
known as the contras, many of whom were trained in psychological warfare
tactics (i.e terrorism) at the infamous School of Americas in Fort Bening
Georgia.
Waging a covert war against the Nicaraguan civilian population, designed to
coerce and intimidate nicaraguans into forcing the democratically elected
Santanista government from office, in 1989 the Santanistas brought their
case before the world court, the court ruled in the Santanistas favour,
condemning what they called "unlawful use of force" (i.e. terrorism), and
ordered the United States to pay $60 billion dollars in war reparations. As
Chomsky is quick to point out that the United States is the only Nation, to
have been both condemned by the world court for "unlawful use of force" and
to have vetoed a UN resolution calling upon members to obeyed by
international law.
This brings us to a question that the US President George Bush posed to the
Muslim world, "why do they hate us?". The truth is the Arab world doesn't
begrudge the United States because of their freedom and prosperity, The
United States are despised because of their foreign policy. While Osama Bin
Laden is reprehensible, we all know this, it's unjust to punish a nation
because of the actions of a recalcitrant few. Bin Laden and his supporter's
grievances are legitimate. They blame America for 1,000,000 children who
have according to the World Health Organisation, died in Iraq because of
harsh economic sanctions. They reproach them for the plight of the
Palestinians living under illegal Israeli occupation. Thus it isn't
difficult to conceive why America is so hated around the world.
The war in Afganistan smacks of hypocrisy. Which now leads us to the explore
the machinations behind the war. Let me begin by paraphrasing an article
that appeared in the BBC on the 18th of September . The Story quotes the
former Pakistani foreign secretary Niaz Naikas saying he was told by a
senior American officials in mid-July that military action against
Afghanistan would go ahead by the middle of October. Mr Naik said US
officials told him of the plan at a UN- sponsored international contact
group on Afghanistan which took place in Berlin. A story appearing in the
Indian public affairs magazine India Reacts in June of 2001 confirms this
report, The article announces that India and Iran will "facilitate" the
planned US-Russia hostilities against the Taliban.
The war in Afghanistan was being planned months before the attacks. This
contradicts the official government line that the war in Afghanistan was
primarily aimed at dismantling the al-quadea terrorist network. The real
objective was to oust the Taleban from power. One possible motive for doing
this, is UNOCAL's plans to build an oil pipeline through Afghanistan to
transport oil from the Caspian to markets in South Asia. This oil pipeline
would likely be constructed by Haliburton, a company that American
vice-president Dick Cheney was once the CEO of, and stands to benefit
enormously.
It is also worth noting that both the American ambassador to Afghanistan and
the interim Afghan President are former petroleum negotiators for UNOCAL.
Central Asia is strategically important, as Zbigniew Brzezinski, the former
national security advisor for the Carter Administration, says in his 1997
book The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy And It's Geostrategic
Imperatives. "Ever since the continents started interacting politically,
some five hundred years ago, Eurasia has been the center of world power." -
p. xiii. Eurasia is all of the territory east of Germany and Poland,
stretching all the way through Russia and China to the Pacific Ocean.
It includes the Middle East and most of the Indian subcontinent. The key to
controlling Eurasia, says Brzezinski, is controlling the Central Asian
Republics. And the key to controlling the Central Asian republics is
Uzbekistan". A country that America is now heavily invested in. The Taleban
is an abonimation, we all know this, but are the Northern Alliance any
better? According to human rights watch 50,000 civilians died during the
Northern Alliances rule of kabul from 1992-96.
Wasn't it also the Northern Alliance that was responsible for introducing
harsh shira law?. The Taleban even agreed to the initial US demands to hand
over Bin Laden. Offering America a quid pro quo, agreeing to hand over Bin
Laden in return for evidence. When this evidence wasn't forthcoming they
recanted on their offer. To date there has been no unequivocal proof
convicting Bin Laden or al-quadea of responsibilty for the september 11th
hijackings.
The Bush administration is now threatening to expand the "war on terrorism"
to other so-called rouge states such as Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Which
Bush said in his state of the union address to congress, constitute an "axis
of evil". There has been recent calls by both parties to invade Iraq, Mr
Bush's vitriol has been received with consternation in the Arab world, Saui
Arabia has refused to grant the United States access to it's air space, and
Russia has publicly stated that it will veto any US request to attack Iraq.
There is also a real danger that an attack on Iraq could provoke a regional
war. The atrocities of September 11th, have been cynically used by the Bush
administration as a pretext to pass draconian anti-terrorist legislation
through congress, abrogating civil liberties, and creating the orwellian
Office of Homeland Security, which has effectively given carte blanche to
arrest and detain suspects incommunicado, and monitor electronic
communication. Another key benefactor of the war on terror has been the
military industrial complex, before September 11th the Defence Department
was in dire straights, having never passed a Government audit in the
departments history, and according to a General Accounting Office (GAO)
inspector General's report could not account for 2.4 trillion dollars.
The pentagon was faced with the prospect of massive budget cuts. Post
September 11th has seen the largest increase in defence spending in US
history, paving the way for the multi-trillion dollar Antiballistic Missile
Defence Shield (ABM), that the Federation of American Scientists has said is
"doomed to fail", and the multi-billion dollar Joint Strike Fighter.
Simply put "The war on terrorism" is a farce, a shambolic attempt to plunder
third world resources, and extend American hegemony. The war has
destabilised Asia, setting dangerous precedents, allowing any Nation to
attack another Nation on the grounds of combating terrorism, as has been
recently seen in Pakistan and India, and is currently being seen in Israel.
When will military leaders learn, that Violence only begets violence. If the
United States is serious about ending terrorism, Instead of bombing innocent
Afghan civilians. The US government should withdraw it's support for
despotic regimes, and stop imposing it's will on smaller nations. The
leaders of the world should be focusing on waging peace, not war! However
There can be no lasting peace without justice, and a recognition of the
privations of the millions of oppressed around the world. Then and only
then, will there be an end to terrorism. As Ghandi said "An eye for an eye
makes the whole world blind". What is needed now more then ever is justice
not revenge.
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